Railway Encroachment (Les Travaux du Chemin de Fer, à Brentford)
Sir Francis Seymour Haden British
Not on view
Seymour Haden was the unlikely combination of a surgeon and an etcher. Although he pursued a very successful medical career, he is mostly remembered for his etched work as well as for his writings on etching. He was one of a group of artists, including James McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) and Alphonse Legros (1837–1911), whose passionate interest in the medium led to the so-called etching revival, a period that lasted well into the twentieth century. The extolling of etching for its inherent spontaneous qualities reached its pinnacle during this time. While the line of the etching needle, Haden wrote, was "free, expressive, full of vivacity," that of the burin was "cold, constrained, uninteresting," and "without identity."
The river Thames, Kew a wooden construction for a railway embankment at left; trees and vegetation, at right.
"First.-'Kew 1864.' Published in Études à l'eau-forte (No. IX), under the title of 'Kew Railway Extension.'"
[Source: Harrington, p. 36]
"State II (D1, H1). Published in Études à l'eau-forte (No. IX). Drypoint work on the background trees at the center so that they adjoin the right side of the construction, and a drypoint line extends the top of the construction at the left almost ot the edge of the plate. The outline of trees behind the center of the construction indicated with dryoint."
[Source: Schneiderman, p. 173]
